Holding Off Insanity
by Magestar
Summary: This is Alice's story from the beginning, starting with her stay at the mental institution. Basically on hiatus.
1. Date Uncertain

**A/N:** I'm sorry about the weird breakup of sentences, but that's how Alice talks to me. This is a first person of Alice starting when she's human at the mental institution. Also, my only experience with psych wards is from the out of time series by Caroline B Cooney and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Vision headaches are out of Angel. I'm in the market for a beta-reader. I'm trying really hard to stick to canon, so please call me on any mistakes I might make in that arena. Chapters will generally be pretty short, as they are essentially diary entries. To make up for that, I'll try to have a lot of them.

Disclaimer: Twilight and connected characters belong to Stephenie Meyer and her publishers, etc. much as I'd love to own them.

----

_Date uncertain, 1920_

I'm not insane. Really. Even if I do occasionally have weird images popping into my head that end up coming true hours or days later and are accompanied by sudden shattering headaches. Which is usually a symptom of insanity. But most of the time I am in full possession of my mental faculties.

That's a nice phrase.

But because of aforementioned images, my parents realized I could hurt their precious _reputation_ if I had one of these... "episodes," as they called them, in a public place. So I died and went to a looney bin.

I mean, I didn't really die, of course. Having a daughter locked up is seven times worse than anything I might do in one of these episodes, and I was small and thin and pale enough to start with that my death would not be highly questioned.

I was sent to Biloxi Regional Hospital, where they looked at me, looked at my father's name, and said "Hmm, interesting. Yes, she certainly not fit to remain in society," and diagnosed my with something incredibly long that I can't spell and won't even attempt.

From there I went to the Gulf Psychiatric Hospital with nothing but a certificate of my own death (which is kind of macabre when you think about it), which is near the Gulf coast, but not actually _on_ it, making the name a little misleading. That sentence was also misleading. Gulf PH is not quite on the coast, no my certificate of death (though technically it is too because I'm at GPH). This is making my head spin.

They shaved my head. They shaved my head! Need me to repeat? They shaved my head!! I //am// was so proud of my hair. It was black and thick and so long I had to be careful not to sit on it if it was down.

I wonder what happened to my hair.

-----

Later:

Where was I? Oh, hair, right.

I don't really feel like talking about GPH (too long to write out). But there's not really much point in writing this otherwise.

I should have had the presence of mind to find something to count the days with, because no one tells you and I quickly lost track (memory--never my strong point. One of the reasons I'm writing this). All I know is it's long enough for me to grow about two inches of hair, which sticks straight up and is doubtlessly highly unattractive.

I finally decided I should write this down. I'm still not sure why. I'm destined to die in here so it won't do me any good. But it does feel good to write. Once I decided this, I was stopped short by one simple problem: no paper.

I have not quite fallen to the levels of the prison inmate writing on scraps of toilet paper. You know how some books have those blank pages at the end? There's some books in the common room that I pulled the pages from. I'm writing very small (which is a lot harder than it looks).

Got to go now. To be continued.


	2. That Vision Thing

**A/N:** Thanks to those who reviewed! Two short entries here.

NellieGURL: I think it said somewhere in canon that Alice's date of admission to the mental institution was the same as the date on her death certificate. This was the first plausible explaination I came up with.

**Disclaimer:** Not mine. :tear:

----

_Date Still Uncertain (2 days later), 1920_

I had a vision (that's the only thing to call it really). I felt like I should record it.

It was two images of the same man. In the first one he was wearing an old-style military uniform in blue and red, leaning over a table with a lamp on it in what looked like a tent. In the second one he was wearing normal clothes (white shirt, tan pants, suspenders) and sitting by a dead fountain at night. He was tall, thin but strong, and had dark blond hair that looked like amber or honey or molasses. I never saw his eyes.

I think that's all I saw.

There's a new janitor. He scares me. He's a small man, very pale, and he wears funny tinted-black spectacles. He didn't look at anyone in the room except me. It was funny, it felt like he was looking straight through my eyes and into _me_. I was addicted and repelled at the same time, if that is possible. I'm afraid of him. I said that already, but it's true. And yet somehow I keep hoping to see him again.

This has become my safety, this writing, and I've only just started. I keep it in my shirt and I always know it's there, even when I can't take it out. So I really have nothing to write about, but I don't want to stop.

The name on my death certificate says Mary Brandon and the name on my wristband says Alice. Just Alice. But the name I'm registered at GPH with is Alice Leigh (my mother's maiden name). I have one sister. Her name is Cynthia. Mostly I try not to think about her or my parents because they were the ones who stuck me here in the first place. I suppose that should bother me. And it does, I guess, a little, but it doesn't surprise me.

---

_unknown (1 week since previous entry), 1920_

I'm pretty sure it's still 1920. It's fall though.

I had another vision. It was like a family photograph. I was there, and the man from the vision last week. There were three other men, all of them young, and three women. The backdrop was forest, but it looked cloudy. It didn't look like around here, that's for sure.

That's not the weirdest thing, though. When I got up off the bed where I'd collapsed, I _swear_ that I saw the janitor peering through the little wire-enforced piece of glass in the door and then hurry away. And I keep getting the feeling like I'm being watched or that he's around somewhere.

Maybe it's just this place getting to me. It's enough to make anyone paranoid.

* * *

There will be several more journal entries by when we get up to when Alice is about to be changed it won't really be possible anymore, so the style will change. Keep reviewing!  



	3. Nathaniel

Un-beta'ed, you have been warned. Just wanted to get this out as fast as possible. Words like //this// are crossed out. Disclaimer: As per usual, I don't own. However, Lucien and the janitor-man are mine.

* * *

_4 days (or 6, I'm forgetting) since last entry, 1920_

I got some answers.

I'll try to get this down with as much detail and accuracy as I can recall.

The presentment that I was being watched continued, though whenever I tried to catch him at it, he wasn't around. Or even anywhere near, as far as I could tell. But I knew it was him. Don't know how, but I knew.

I was scared, but it was an excited kind of scared, partially out of relief that I was was doing anything, anything at all. Being here is enough to drive anyone insane with sheer boredom.

And then... IT happened.

Sorry. I'm being mysterious.

...Wait. Who am I talking (writing?) to? Maybe I am going insane.

Maybe I imagined this whole thing.

On with the story.

It's never fully dark at GPH. There are always lights in the hall and a night guard. So even though it was after "lights out" (our bedtime. I had a bedtime when I was five.) there was still enough light to see. Despite that, I never noticed //Him// him come into my room; he was just _there_. I jumped, but did not scream, I'm proud to say (though I'm not sure why I should be, or would want to be)

If this were a proper story, it would have mentioned that there is a window the approximate size of a postage stamp in my room and I was trying to look at the stars. I turned away and there he was. So I suppose that makes it less surprising that I didn't notice him.

He said sorry --for scaring me, I presume-- and I turned all the way around to watch him carefully. I didn't trust him. And I was alone with him, which scared me.

He was behaving in a strange way. He tried to pace, but it only takes about a step and a half to cross the width of the room and he didn't seem inclined to come closer to me. This was good; if he had, I might have screamed, or fainted (I've never fainted before, sounds interesting ...and a bit romantic). Then he got very still. I mean impossibly still. At some point he said "I can't do this anymore" and I made the marvelously intelligent response of: "huh?"

He looked at me for a second or two (well, his head turned in my general direction; it couldn't see his eyes at all, so it was impossibly to tell exactly where he was looking). It occurred to me that maybe he was blind (ha!) He went back to his nervous movement and at one point I thought he was going to punch the wall, but he just got very still again with his fist against the wall. I couldn't take my eyes off him. Then he said "This is harder than I thought." The words were so fast and quiet that I thought they might have been addressed to himself. He composed himself with obvious effort and turned again to face me. "Let me tell you a story."

I honestly believe that there was a single thought in my head at this point, so it was impossible for me to say anything.

He told it very haltingly, but gained momentum as he went. It went something like this:

"There was a man. In 1712. He was indentured to a merchant, along with two negroes. They were... badly treated. So the three of them ran away together. They made it nearly to Appalachia and thought that they had made it far enough that there was not much danger of being caught any longer. A man approached where they were staying that night (under a tree). I use the word man loosely. He was white like ivory or marble and his eyes were smooth garnets. He smiled and his teeth were whiter than his face. He was well dressed, so we naturally assumed that he'd turn us in, so we began to scramble to our feet, intending to run. In a heartbeat, he moved.

"They were dead before I'd even stood up. He turned to me. There was a split second when I had the chance to scream, but I stayed still. I was going to die, like Michael and Ali had died, and there was nothing I could do about it. I didn't fight, that would have been pointless, and besides, there was no time, but I'd be damned if I was scared to face Death --for that was who I thought had found us in the woods that night. He stopped short of killing me and met me eyes. He told me I looked like a strong one and that he'd have want of a companion.

"Then he bit me. It was pain like no other, and it wouldn't stop. But finally, after far too long, it did. I awoke to new strengths and sensations, which I learned to understand with Lucien's tutelage: I was a vampire. He wanted someone he could mold, and I'm afraid I did not satisfy him. I could not see the sport in killing, hunting, the fine art of control needed for torture. I like to say he loved me enough to understand that and let me go, but really he discarded me to look for another who could be what he wanted.

"After that I wandered. And killed. I should deny it, but I'm being honest now. I couldn't stop. I kept away from people as much as I could, but I was--am a slave to my hunger. That's why I'm here: looking for a meal that won't be missed. But

"But then I saw you. You don't belong here, you have too much fire, and joy, but this place is leeching that away. And... and I wanted you to see that you need your fire, you have given me new hope, for truth be told I had giving up. And now I'm standing here babbling like an idiot or a schoolboy though I have been past two hundred years in this world, and you don't believe me anyway. But I had to tell you something. And tell you that I knew you were losing in this place and that I don't want that."

And then he was leaving. I almost missed the motion. "Wait," I called. He turned. I didn't know what to call him. "What's your name?" I asked.

"Nathaniel."

I said nothing, so he figured I was done, and left silently. And for the life of me, I cannot remember what I was going to say.

* * *

The proper author's note:I wanted it to be after you read it. Lucien is my little homage to LaCroix (from _Forever Knight_). I tried to be historically accurate, but if I messed up, feel free to call me on that. I tried to keep the story within a story within a story as non-confusing as possible. What's the verdict on Nathaniel (he was almost called Jeremiah, but I came to my senses, thank god)? Sorry again for the delay; my life has been a real mess. 


	4. And He Told Me

_The next day , 1920_

I thought I wouldn't be able to sleep. But before I'd been able to come to any sort of conclusion about what happened (except that I'm pretty sure it did actually happen), I got another vision thing.

Nathaniel and I were running. Actually he was half carrying me, but I seemed to be trying. Nathaniel's glasses were gone and his eyes were a dark burgundy, like the Lucien from his story. Another ...one was following us, jumping with catlike agility and moving much faster than we could hope to. His eyes were bright and clear, but red as well. This red was far more terrifying than Nathaniel's more muted color.

And then it ended and I fell asleep. I slept solidly, but I'm still tired. However, the vision convinced me that there is something to Nathaniel's story (I do trust the insides of my eyelids, however strange that is). Possibly the fact that useless pictures dance in my head (clog dancing, to account for the headaches) makes me more amenable to strange stories about ...dammit, why can't I write it?

Vampires.

I don't know. If I am going crazy, at least it's pretty interesting. It would be terribly frustrating to be bored by one's own mind.

I made up my mind that, even if I couldn't quite trust Nathaniel or his story, I would at least talk to him--frequently if possible. He was much too interesting to let go of.

But if he's so dangerous?

You weren't going to get out of here anytime soon //Mary Alice Brandon// Alice, just Alice.

So I'm going to go look for him.

---

_The next day, 1920_

I found him. He was doing the floors in one of the hallways. The hallways are so white it sometimes hurts to look at them, even the floors, but you can see it's just cheap wood panelling underneath. I hate it.

We just stared at each other from about 20 feet away in the empty hall. Seconds dragged on. It became clear that he wasn't going to say anything. That meant I had to.

"I think I believe you. Or I could get to believe you," I told him. "What now?"

He still said nothing and I started to wonder if he had heard me. I opened my mouth to repeat myself.

"I don't know," he said finally, as if he was surprised at his own answer. "I don't know."

"You could tell me a story," I said. I had taken my morning meds already and had nowhere to be for hours. "You told that story rather well, even if you did change from 3rd to 1st person partway through. I have nothing better to do. Tell me about--" It's just word "--Vampires."

And he told me.

* * *

**A/N:** As per usual, sorry for the delay. I won't write more until winter break, probably. I have a ton of school work and I want to re-edit what I've got to submit to pel and her fancy twilight fanfic site (check it out). However, I have another chapter written that I'll post sometime between now and then. This is the second time I've tried to post this; grr. And I really want to be able to do strikethroughs! A huge thank you to Vechababe, TooMuchLoveForEdward, NellieGURL, and Linnea Leitner for your reviews! 


	5. Running Away

_Two weeks later, 1920_

I really should have been keeping this up.

Why? No one is going to read it and even if they do, they shall think I'm delusional. Visions and vampires, not exactly plausible.

So I don't forget.

I'm having a conversation with myself. Stop it.

I spent the two weeks where I didn't write listening to Nathaniel and remembering to keep my distance. He told me of Lucien's instruction. If it had been me, I think I might have gotten tired of talking (yes, me, tired of talking), but Nathaniel seemed to enjoy it. I wondered how long it had been since he'd had anyone else to talk to.

What I now know about vampires (or What Nathaniel learned from Lucien hopefully in some semblance of order):

They are very pale, with red eyes. The eye color gets darker the more hungry they are. They drink blood and have a very strong sense of smell, so it is hard for them to be around humans without losing control and killing them. Nathaniel stresses that a lot. They don't die, they don't grow, they don't change. They can't be killed except by other vampires, and their skin is as hard as diamond. Myths debunked: stakes, crosses, holy water, sunlight (though something does happen; all Nathaniel will say is it's "interesting"), coffins, crossing water.

I haven't told Nathaniel about my visions. I'm not quite sure why. Maybe I still don't trust him.

I've seen that family again, the one that includes me and the soldier. Twice. If I have to endure these headaches, at least let me see something new!

---

_Three days later, 1920 (I think...)_

I didn't think that there was anything that could scare Nathaniel, besides maybe Lucien. I was wrong.

He had told me about the Hunters, the ones who would give up everything to track a single quarry (is quarry singular?) until caught, no matter how long it took.

One of the best is named James. Lucien knew him, or said he knew him, according to Nathaniel. He is in the area.

Nathaniel says he would find me an interesting prey, as I am the still-human consort of a vampire (his word not mine (consort)), and would therefore be protected.

We are leaving.

I should be excited. I never thought I would get out of this place. And here comes Nathaniel like some knight in shining armor (or grimy jumpsuit, whichever you prefer) to take me away from the insanity. It should be heaven.

So why am I scared? I wasn't scared of Nathaniel. Well, actually I was, but not like this. I'm scared because Nathaniel is scared, and he's practically unkillable (is that a word?).

He tries not to show it. He tries not to let me see how much James terrifies him. But I watch him. I watch how is hands clench so tightly that, if they belonged to anyone else, would have drawn blood.

I'm not sure I'll survive this. That never bothered me before, but now I'm afraid for my life.

--

_Kathleen stopped, stunned. She flipped over the heavy sheet. Blank. That was it. How was that possible? There was a rattle of a key and the sound of footsteps. She stuffed the pages down her shirt quickly. No one came in. She curled up on her bed until she was sure they were gone. She pulled out the pages, her only companion here. She had found them, slightly crumpled, tucked between the mattress and the springs of her cot. She had read them quickly. She wasn't sure if they were meant to be fiction or if they were told by someone truly mad, but it was a good story._

_It just ended. She reread the last line. _I'm not sure I'll survive this. That never bothered me before, but now I'm afraid for my life. _That was no way to end it. What happened next?_

_Struck by a new idea she skittered off her bed and checked the mattress again. Nothing. Wait! That definitely felt like paper. She grabbed it as firmly as possible and pulled. It came, slowly, grudgingly, for a few inches. She heard a tearing sound and stopped immediately. It was caught on one of the springs. She crawled out from under the bed and lifted the thin mattress to attack from the top. After a few moments of struggle, she held a tightly folded paper in her hands. Was is more? She unfolded it slowly, hoping it would not tear further. _

_It was a death certificate. She read the name: Mary Alice Brandon. Date of death: July 18, 1920. _

_So at least part of it was true. She wanted the rest of the story._

* * *

**A/N:** Second time trying to update this. I had a nice pretty author's note all typed up, and now I have to redo it. Damn.

This is the end of what I think of as 'the first part.' I have no idea what that means in terms of the length of the overall story. Since this is the end of Alice's diary ((tear)) the rest of the chapters will hopefully be longer. My finals end Monday afternoon, but then I have to go to the readthrough for 'Thoroughly Modern Millie.' I will update as soon as I can write the next bit. I'm not sure of what I think of the ending. Opinions... _  
_


	6. The Dark

**A/N:** First order of business is, as usual, to apologize for the delay. I was planning to write more, but I spent a lot of time just resting and then I got into a car accident. And then I had major writer's block. So this isn't an actual chapter. Sorry. But it will come ...sometime...

What this is: I reread _Twilight_ a couple of days ago, and got a more realistic idea of Alice in the mental institution. This is an alternate beginning to this story. It doesn't really matter whether or not you read it, the plot of _Insanity_ from here on out remains the same.

Have a piece of angst for Christmas dinner!

* * *

It's dark. So dark. You lose yourself in it. I don't know who I am in the dark. Where I am in the dark.

Sometimes it hurts. But it's still dark. It hurts until the gray cloud comes and takes me away from the pain.

But then the dark comes back. And the noises in the dark. Screams. Cries. Sometimes I think they are from me. Who is me? I don't know. I don't know anything anymore. With the dark there is no room for me in my head.

I can't give up. I can't die. I try. They make the pain come back. Bad enough but not enough for my gray relief.

Sometimes there are pictures in the dark. Pictures of a man blond and dangerous sitting at a fountain. He is waiting for me. I want to tell him no I can't come but the pictures goes away and I can't reach him anymore. There are pictures of a girl with short black hair. She laughs a lot. I don't know what it feels like to laugh. A man ordinary but pale as death is looking for me. He wants to kill me. I hope he hurries up.

And the stories. At night they come. Stories of adventure. Frontiers. New things. In the stories there is also day as well as night. They lie. I don't like the stories. Always they are over but I am still in the dark. The dark is worse after the stories. I want them to go away. I need them. My stories. The stories come on a soft tenor voice.

The voice comes but the stories don't. The voice says. I have no choice. I want you. Sorry for the hurt.

The hurt. Pain. Fire. Worse. No gray to save me. Pain. Burning. Rearranging. Making me not me. Why won't I just die?


End file.
